It’s Flashback Friday. Every Friday we bring back a golden oldie article from yesteryear. A chance for you to re-read it and see if it is still relevant today!
From today, any song whatsoever that’s downloaded (from the legal sites being surveyed) can appear in the (singles) charts. The previous rules were that the (singles) charts were compiled from the sales of whatever singles were being currently pushed by the music industry and those who control it. This then liberalised to include figures for the downloading of songs currently being pushed as singles. That meant it excluded songs that were not current ‘singles’ from inclusion in the figures.
But, from today, the rules have changed. Anything that’s downloaded is counted.
In a way, isn’t this really the ‘death’ of the single, disguised as a liberalisation of surveying what’s hot and what’s not? So, it’s a lot more important turning point than we realise. I’m all for it, don’t get me wrong.
It’ll be interesting to see if downloading trends are such that, for example, when films are shown on TV, the next day everybody downloads the songs played within the film and this reflects in the following week’s chart.
In practical terms, does this mean that whenever BBC1 shows Titanic then we get bleedin’ Celine at number one?
Also, will the music execs now be putting pressure on the TV companies to play certain films? How will this work for Simon Cowell and the way he dominates the charts with old rehashed ballads virally marketed via his pretend talent shows like X Factor?
It wasn’t that long ago that Top of the Pops finally died, and this is looking like it’s goodbye to the single. It could also mean it’s goodbye to the whole concept of ‘current pop’, which would explain why modern radio is no longer slave to the chart (Radio 1 certainly doesn’t play stuff from the charts that doesn’t fit with its demographics).
I’m guessing that by this time next year things will be very different when it comes to who is controlling music sales.
England's England 